CMLL Super Viernes Live Review

We’re starting a little late tonight sports fans! Blame it both on me watching the CEO X NJPW show on Twitch at the same time and CMLL starting late themselves. But we’re here now and it’s time to do the live review. ON WITH THE SHOW!

This is going to be a very angry recap of this match sports fans so let’s just get the good part out of the way. And by good part I mean Derek Zoolander’s favorite luchador!

Now that that’s out the way, my Grodd this match blew chunks. It’s not Magnus or Principe Diamante’s fault; in fact the only good part of the match was the conclusion of the second fall where both technicos took over and delivered some honest to Grodd exciting lucha libre. Unfortunately that was all they got. The rest of this match was Signo and Espanto Jr. in complete control, climaxing in a sequence where both rudos got to hit back to back Canadian Destroyers followed by a splash. Bullshit; if anything it should be the other way around. You just feel for Magnus and Diamante considering they’re both miles ahead of Espanto and Signo and yet CMLL felt it best for this to go the other way. Lame, lame and lame. I’m not surprised the tradition of lame CMLL openers continued but this felt even lamer than usual. And no it’s not just the Magnus mark in me saying that…alright some of it is, but still!

I called it! This match was much better than it looked on paper thanks to some strong efforts from everyone involved. Pegasso was the only guy who didn’t really stand out and that’s fine considering the biggest move he’s busting out is the “land on your knees” 450. Everyone else seemed to be branching out. Disturbio bit some nipples and hit a running knee attack, but he was also breaking out running sentons off the apron. Stigma was used only in short bursts and came across far better than he usually does dominating matches in Puebla. Okumura continued his streak of solid performances, capped off with an AWESOME match winning Superplex that I’d advise him breaking out some more if it wasn’t going to put him in a wheelchair. But the biggest credit goes to Kawato and Star Jr. Yes Kawato dropped Pegasso on a suicide dive but a) Pegasso can barely get any air these days and b) Kawato caught a much harder dive by Stigma later on so he’ll be forgiven. Plus he looked awesome the rest of the match so we’ll give him a pass. And Star Jr. looked like a superstar with his big dives, nonstop energy and just a jump off the screen presence; he’s always had it, but it came across here more than it even did during his run in the Gran Alternativa (where unfortunately he picked the wrong time to botch). All in all it combined to make this a surprisingly fun second match. Well for everyone else cause I called it yesterday! Cause I’m smooth like that.

WHAT DID I JUST SEE?! I thought this match going in would be good and somehow it wound up being as good, if not better, than the Panther’s match last week that saw Blue Panther do a gorram crowd dive! I’m almost in disbelief, until you remember how good these three technicos are. That’s not to take away from Mephisto, Templario and even Ephesto; all three rudos did a hell of a job basing in this match for the never ending stream of dives Cometa, Maya and Stuka broke out. But this was all about those three technicos. Maya broke out the Super Calo dive (though he didn’t quite make the seats), hit another suicide dive through Stuka’s legs and in between produced some well paced, super smooth sequences with Templario and Mephisto that made me want to see more of those match ups. Stuka Jr. was awesome; he’s been on fire ever since that Ultimo Guerrero match and he was flying around all over the place again here, showing he could keep up with his more celebrated partners. And I don’t think we need to question whether Rey Cometa can still deliver the goods. I didn’t think anything could top his death defying tornillo to end the second fall, until he broke out Brillo Cometa for the first time in forever and nailed it flush. It was as if he, Maya and Stuka, had some sort of intel about what Fenix (excuse me, I mean King Phoenix) was going to do later and stepped up their game. Whether it was or not is irrelevant because this RULED! A great match, a great set of performances from those three and a hell of a job by the rudos making it all look great.

Just when you thought things may be slowing down, along came this match! It wasn’t on the level of the last match and (while we still have two matches to go and who knows) I reckon it will probably be the forgotten match of the mid card much like Atlantis’ match last week was. Even still this was a lot fun, with yet another excellent second fall conclusion that saw Angel de Oro jump from Niebla Roja’s back to the floor, followed by a Roja dive and La Atlantida (if you want to go further, Oro also did a stage dive in fall two and three). Everything else worked too! The Dinamitas were on their game all the way through, delivering their excellent triple teams and doing a hell of a job selling for Atlantis in the third fall. I’ll give Atlantis some credit too as he was (once again) doing moves he usually doesn’t do, but obviously a lot of that has to do with his comfort level with the NGD. They made him feel safe doing those moves and thus everything came off well. With all that going on all that was left was for Oro and Roja to deliver the goods and, as already stated, they did. Oro in particular continues to look like a new man without the mask. Before he wrestled fine but like he was going through the motions; now he looks like he’s been shot out of a cannon in every match and has become more aggressive in what he goes for. It’s proof that sometimes it’s best to lose the mask! In any event, this was another really solid match and it’s a shame for the second week Atlantis has had a better than usual performance on a show where everything (outside the opener) appears to be clicking. Hence we all forget when it’s over.

King Phoenix defeated Cavernario two falls to one

Nope. No that doesn’t do this match justice.

STILL NOT ENOUGH!

ONE MORE SHOULD DO IT!

And we’re good. Ladies and gentlemen I saw LA Park vs. Rush just one week ago, I saw Kenny Omega vs. Kazuchika Okada IV just a few days before that; hell in between I saw a grown man satisfy a camel (just kidding. Or am I?). This bad boy may have topped them all. Holy shit. This was in many ways a similar match to the excellent bout Cavernario and Soberano had earlier this year in the same building (on a Tuesday show no less), only with the volume turned up over 9,000. Like that match Cavernario controlled the action all the way to the end of fall two, swinging Phoenix into the barricade multiple times, sending the Lucha Underground star into the crowd a few other times and even finding time to hit the splash to the floor as Dave Meltzer shed a single tear. Then Fenix (sorry…oh screw it, he’s still Fenix to me!) got back momentum, caught Cav in the same pin he used to win the Lucha Underground Championship from Mil Muertes to steal fall two and it gave way to a third fall full of nonstop dives, big moves, high drama and a whole lot emotion from a pro Cavernario Arena Mexico crowd. It was out of this world good. The amazing thing is for Fenix is that this may have been just another day at the office. He’s this good practically all the time; hell we saw that just this Wednesday in that outstanding Three Way to the Grave match. You almost take for granted how out of this world he was in this match, which isn’t altogether a bad thing because Cavernario deserves a whole hell of a lot of praise. Remember, there were some people (myself included) who wondered if Cav could hang with Fenix. The lesson as always; we were idiots. Cavernario not only hung with Fenix but was frankly just as good as him the whole way through, with a performance that should solidify him as a top star in lucha libre for years to come. You know; if he wasn’t already due to the Volador matches and what not. I don’t know what else to say. Last week I couldn’t imagine, even knowing this match was coming, that anything could top LA Park vs. Rush other than the Aniversario match between those two. I was wrong. This topped it. What I, and hopefully you, saw here was the best match in Mexico thus far and, other than Okada-Omega IV, the best match I’ve seen this year thus far. What an honor it was to see it.

For a moment it looked like CMLL was going to end this show on a colossal dud of a main event. And when I say dud, I mean a dud of Justice League proportions. It started with CMLL giving Cibernetico and Zorro new names (I won’t even bother to tell you them because a) they can easily be found and b) they’re so bad your intelligence will be insulted just reading them out loud) and it snowballed from there, a combination of the match being designed to do nothing and Ciber, Zorro and Sharly just not having it anymore. It got so bad that Volador looked like he wanted to walk out of the match and fly all the way to Russia to take in the World Cup instead. It was that bad and it all would’ve left a bad taste in everyone’s mouth…if not for the ace of Lucha Underground riding in on the white horse to save the day.

Your eyes do not deceive you. That is Lucha Underground Champion, future Triplemania headliner and brother of Fenix himself, Penta Zero M (aka Pentagon Dark, Pentagon Jr. and a whole slew of other names), standing over Caristico. He appeared at the end of the match, laid out Caristico for the DQ, watched as Ciber, Zorro and even Volador caned Caristico (because why not?) and then challenged The Artist Formerly Known as Mistico/Sin Cara/Myzteziz to a match next week. Caristico recovered, accepted the challenge and then it turned into LA Park vs. Rush with both luchadores brawling all over Arena Mexico before and even after security broke them up. And it was awesome! So awesome that you can kind of forgive CMLL for the shit main event, especially since Pentagon coming out during it didn’t ruin a damn thing because it had already gone to hell. And best of all it now gives us a third straight humongous match in CMLL next week and a rematch of a match these two had in The Crash (a match that led to all this). I’m honestly not sure that these two can pass what Fenix and Cavernario did tonight or what LA Park and Rush did last week but a) we all thought Fenix-Cav couldn’t be in the same ballpark and it was (and in my opinion was better) and b) who gives a crap?! We’re getting a third straight match on a CMLL Friday show that at worst is going to be awesome, likely following an undercard that will once again be awesome. I have no complaints. This was an outstanding post main event angle that salvaged the awful main event, closed the show strong and gives us something to look forward to again next week. Brilliant stuff.

What a night! I began it with the intent of watching both the New Japan show and CMLL back to back; I confess that I turned off the New Japan show to fully concentrate on CMLL at one point because things were going that well in Arena Mexico. And it never let up. I keep waiting for CMLL to come down and revert back to having good, if not great, Friday night shows and yet we keep getting these epic nights week after week now. All because CMLL is now opening their doors to big name independent luchadores, which has led to them showing what they can do on a big stage while also motivating CMLL’s own talent to step up. That’s the thing everyone will forget tonight. Pentagon’s debut and Fenix-Cavernario will rightfully be the talk of the town, but let’s not forget how explosive Angel de Oro, Niebla Roja and the Dinamitas were in the fourth match or how balls to the wall crazy Guerrero Maya Jr., Rey Cometa and Stuka Jr. went in the third match (hell don’t sleep on Star Jr. and Kawato San’s work in the second bout either!). Everyone is stepping up and almost everyone is knocking it out of the park for CMLL right now. It’s awesome. It’s bloody awesome. I cannot recall a time since I started watching CMLL when it’s more entertaining every Friday than it is now. And guess what; it’s just going to get better! It’s like CMLL has become the Uncharted series of wrestling out of nowhere.

And with that, I’m out sports fans. My home planet needs me. Till next time!

About The Author

Eric Mutter is a straight edge nerd with a love for Pepsi and a punk rock song in his heart. His friends may or may not refer to him as Cult Icon (or Colt Iken when they're doing Scott Steiner impressions). He's also good at writing; or so I hear.

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